THERE IS NO need for legislation to enforce school development plans, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities says in a critique of the Standards in Scotland’s Schools Bill now before the Parliament.
Danny McCafferty, the convention’s education spokesman, said that schools needed a development plan, “but to enshrine the administration arrangements into the legislation is quite simply over-prescription”.
The need to make a development plan available to parents, which is contained in the Bill, should appear as guidance to headteahers and not in statute.
COSLA has proposed a number of amendments to the Bill, including a fuller statement of the purposes of educational provision. “By setting aims in specific areas - in key skills, in citizenship and in enterprise and creativity, with a clear regard for the principles of sustainability - the section would be much more relevant to today’s society and to other aspects of government policy.
“It would also give a direction to school education which the current vague wording does not,” Mr McCafferty said.
